So, I was pretty much frustrated trying to piece together Apache, PHP and MySql on my system so that I could then put WordPress up and finally allow me to learn how this blogging system works, and I was seriously thinking about chucking the whole mess and not worrying about it. LAMP and then Xampp are easier than doing it from scratch, but still a challenge at times.
My boss pointed out that he had set up a Private Blog, where he put up all of his work notes, and found that it was very useful for being able to quickly look things up (as opposed to the hardcover lab books that I have used most of my working career). I asked him how he was able to get this all working, without pulling his own hair out, and he pointed me at Xampp.
LAMP and Xampp How?
So what the heck is Xampp? Well some very nice folks decided that trying to get LAMP running, so what they did was package together a relatively easily-to-install package that includes:
- The Apache Web server, which is really the “gold card” standard for web servers on the internet (apologies to Microsoft, but this is what I think).
- PHP to run on top of the Apache server and you really do need this to run WordPress
- A version of the MySQL database system, which is the engine for the WordPress system (all of your postings are actually stored inside of this beauty).
I got Xampp installed in about 3 hours, after attempting an install without reading their documentation, uninstalling it, and then installing using their documentation (I am an old warhorse regarding computers, so I rarely read documentation).
This then meant that I now had a system set up to run on my laptop computer, which only served HTTP requests from my computer. I did this because I was planning on using the system for my personal notes, and didn’t want other folks reading my personal thoughts (and doing this is quite simple really).
So here I sat on the threshold of getting WordPress working, what did I do next? Come back soon and I’ll tell you about how easy it is to get WordPress up and running.
The Journey to WordPress
- WordPress a really useful exercise – why even start looking at WordPress
- The Journey Continues – to get to WordPress you start with LAMP but what about XAMPP
- WordPress Nirvana – why even set up WordPress on a local computer?
- Installing WordPress Locally – how hard could that be? Not that hard.
- So What You Had WordPress ? You can use it for many different things.
- Why Not Use External Hosting ? I ended up doing just that.